A hill-walking blog.. With added wine.

Whisky

Hills: Wideford Hill Classification: Marilyn When: Thursday 4 January Weather: Very cold, quite windy and at times wet Low points: all the stuff on the summit High points: the sunrise Why: the sunrise Mishaps: Transport

After my desperate attempt to make sure I did a hill every month by doing a local Kent Marilyn as December’s hill, I didn’t get any more walking done in December. I had thought about a last minute dash to the Lakes a couple of times but the weather forecast was never quite good enough to make it worth it and also work got unexpectedly busy in the run up to Christmas with me being more or less flat out until breaking for the festive period. I was back in work between Christmas and New Year but on the 29th we started a long journey due North. We were off to Orkney, via a night in Edinburgh either side. This was not, predominantly, a walking trip and therefore I deliberately didn’t pack much in the way of gear, but figured a coastal walk of some sort might be in order. We also wanted to see the archaeological highlights, a lot of which we had seen before on a previous visit but were definitely worth repeating.

Of course those of you that read my blog on a regular or even sporadic basis will know that something usually goes wrong. This time it was the plane. It was delayed for about an hour then about 5 minutes after taking off from Edinburgh airport something fell off the inside of the aircraft cabin, nearly hitting someone on the head on the way down, and (unsurprisingly) the captain announced we were returning to Edinburgh to see if they could fix the plane. We were decanted from the plane while they did the necessary and got back on about half an hour later. I can’t say I was that enthused about getting back on the same plane in case something more serious fell off this time but with no real alternative we got back on and ended up landing in Kirkwall about 2 hours later than planned. Continue reading →

Those of you that read my blog will know that usually something goes wrong whenever I decide to do a walk. This can often be weather related – for instance the recent deluge in the Lake District not helped by realising that my waterproofs were not fit for purpose (replacements are on order as I type!). If the weather does not go wrong then something else generally will – for instance a transport debacle of some sort which has over the years included missed flights, missed trains, broken down trains, car breakdowns, driving into a ditch in Snowdonia (thankfully managing to get out) and most recently having an utterly hellish journey thanks to Storm Doris meaning my walk for the day was a quick 2 hour blast up Dodd rather than anything more ambitious (due to utter knackeredness). However simply by the law of averages there had to be a walk where nothing went wrong and this one seems to be it!

Stuart and I were staying in Edinburgh for a week in an apartment. The week was mostly about visiting friends and family and chilling out (as well as – in Stuart’s case – going to the rugby) however on a previous jaunt (in less than clement weather) the Pentlands had looked to have some good walking so I hatched a plan to grab a few hours walking and take in the highest point. The forecast for 1st March was pretty good, although windy. Having had a few glasses of wine the previous night (not to mention a couple of gins due to a rather good visit to the Edinburgh Gin Distillery- recommended) an early start was not really an option but the forecast looked decent all day. Continue reading →

Hills: Ben Vrackie
Corbetts: same
Who: Just me and the mountaineering minion
When: end of August 2016
Weather: windy but clear with scattered showers
Bog factor: pretty much non-existent
Post walk watering hole: The Moulin Inn, then the Coach House Hotel in Killin
Post walk drink: Coke (as driving) then Shiraz

This was the walk that got forgotten about! The nights are drawing in, winter is coming (as characters on Game of Thrones would say) and I’m squarely in the middle of my usual ‘off season’ from walking; I had hoped that it might be possible to get another walk in this side of Christmas, but it isn’t going to happen. I did however realise that I’d never quite got round to writing up an account of this walk which was done towards the end of our holiday in Scotland.

Ben Vrackie was a hill I’d meant to do for ages but for whatever reason never quite got around to. For starters it isn’t a Munro and my Scottish walking has very much been focused on those. Secondly I never seemed to quite be in the right place at the right time with the right sort of weather. Thirdly it’s a very popular hill and the parking is pretty limited which always makes me nervous as I hate planning a walk and it then being scuppered by not being able to park, as I’m not an early riser – about the earliest start I can remember recently was 8.30 to do Scafell Pike which was itself a side effect of insomnia rather than actually being deliberate! Continue reading →